Paul G. Schervish and Andrew Herman. Presented at the Conference on Money: Lure, Lore & Liquidity, Hofstra University, Nov. 1991.
This paper examines money in the form of financial wealth and moral capital. Our purpose is to articulate the distinctive characteristics of the wealthy as individual agents in contemporary American capitalist society. We argue that the wealthy are uniquely endowed with material resources and cognitive dispositions that enable them, both as a group and as individuals, to shape the rules, practices and positions of social structure.